Mark Carney has pulled off a dramatic reversal of political fortunes for Canada’s Liberal party, winning the country’s federal election and declaring “Trump will never break us”.

The former governor of both the Bank of England and the Bank of Canada struck a defiant note in a victory speech today, declaring: “We are over the shock of the American betrayal, we have to take care of each other.

"Together we will build a Canada worthy of our values. Canada strong, Canada free, Canada forever, vive le Canada!”

For months, polls in Canada uniformly suggested that Justin Trudeau's Liberal government was heading for defeat to Pierre Poilievre’s Conservatives. Then three things happened. Trudeau finally quit his job as prime minister amid months of brutal public approval ratings. Then U.S. President Donald Trump started escalating his threats about forcing Canada to become the 51st American state. Then Mark Carney handily won the race to replace Trudeau.

I have long told my non-Canadian friends that there is myth of Canadian politeness. We may say sorry a lot, but Canadians are fighters. We’re scrappy, proud and quietly but fiercely patriotic. And as Trump’s threats hung like a spectre over the federal election campaign, Canadian voters apparently wanted a prime minister they felt could best fight the belligerent American president. That man was Carney.

Also today, scroll down to read about the power outage that crippled all of Spain and Portugal. The piece is in Spanish but can be read in other languages through the browsers’ translators.